this is how the summer ends
by ohmygodwhy
Summary: He wants to say: I'm gonna come back changed, Steve, or I ain't coming back at all. I'm gonna come back mean or scared or in a neat little letter saying sorry for your loss. —bucky barnes, at war


other working titles include 'Obnoxious and/or Cliche Literary References: WW2 Angst Edition' or 'I Use T.S. Elliot Too Much'

i just really need more ww2-era bucky in my life? and the commandos are great too i always need more of them

* * *

 _i. Let us go then, you and I,_

 _When the evening is spread out against the sky_

 _Like a patient etherized upon a table;_

 _._

See, the funny thing is: he never really wanted to be a soldier.

The propaganda posters, all bright and shiny, said he should. The younger boys in the neighborhood were convinced. Steve sure as hell was, too. But Bucky—Bucky didn't want to be a soldier.

See, his mama used to tell stories about his father, about how he marched into the Great War enthusiastic and confident; a content man. Half the time he wondered if she was making it all up, because the man who came back only glanced up from his bottle long enough to teach him how to punch or beat on him for breaking one of Ma's fancy plates until his liver finally gave out and killed him.

And his math teacher in eighth grade, Mr. Baker, his right hand always shook and he kept a flask behind his desk and his shoulders were always drawn up tight, like they were strung together by wire. He rambled, and he snapped at people for tapping pens against desks or talking too loudly, and Bucky heard whispers in the halls about Poor Old Baker, shame what happened, Great War really did a number on him.

And Miss McKenzie two floors down, her son enlisted, he saw him walking up the stairs all proud and shiny in his uniform the night before he left and didn't come back. His mama cried loud enough to keep the whole building up half the night when she got the letter saying sorry for your loss, and no one blamed her one bit.

War, see. War changed people. It took and it took and the people it took either ended up dead or different, all fucked up and hollow. Bucky didn't want to end up like that. He sure as hell didn't want Steve to end up like that.

And in the end; in the end, he doesn't have to make that decision, whether or not to enlist, because he trudges up the stairs one afternoon, all sore and achy and tired from a long day down at the docks, and he unlocks the door like usual and bends down to collect the mail cluttered on the floor like usual and tosses it on the table like usual, and somewhere in the middle of the stack is his Letter.

He doesn't have to open it to know what it will tell him, not with the official U.S. Military seal stamped loudly across the envelope.

He opens it anyway, though, after staring at it for a few long moments, with shaky hands and his heart beating in his throat. He gets as far as 'Mr. James Barnes, you' before he's folding it in half again and catching his breath, swallowing to pull himself together.

He reads it slowly, warily, trying to digest it all, and his first thought is: what's gonna happen to Steve?

Because. He's working two and a half jobs, one at the docks and one at Mrs. Jenkins grocery store and half of one helping Old Man Floyd at his garage on the weekends. And Steve is selling his drawings and painting signs and has a part time job at the bookstore that don't pay so well—and he's been having trouble holding down a job lately and even with all of that they're still hard-pressed to pay rent every month, and—

Steve will be two and a half job's worth of money short, and it gets cold as all hell in the winter and he still gets pneumonia every damn year and what if he has an attack and no one's there to find his inhaler? What if he gets himself into a serious scrape and there's no one to stop him from bleeding out?

What's gonna happen to Steve? is his first thought, and his second thought is: what's gonna happen to Steve if I die?

(His third thought is: I'm going to die.)

He doesn't get time to dwell on it, because the door is creaking open and Steve's announcing his arrival and so he folds the letter up quick and shoves it in his pocket and tries his damnedest to ignore it for the rest of the night.

He doesn't tell Steve, which is—bad, probably. He doesn't know why he doesn't tell him, he just. Never gets around to it, it's never the right time.

He keeps the paper shoved in his pocket for three days before he finally sucks it up and tells him he enlisted, because—he doesn't know why. Because he knows how much Steve wants to be a part of this war, how important it is to him, the whole fighting for your country thing, and he doesn't want him to be disappointed in him, maybe. And because if he knew—if he knew his first reason for wanting to stay out of it was him, that he didn't want to ship out because he worried about paying the bills and keeping him warm, he'd be mad as hell.

So. He tells him he enlisted. And he hardly ever sees jealousy on his face, because he's one of those proud people who don't want nothing from anyone else, but he sees it then, just a flicker, before he smiles and says: about damn time. And it makes him want to grip him by his bony shoulders and shake him and say: this isn't a game, this isn't something to be jealous of, this isn't something to want.

He wants to say: I'm gonna come back changed, Steve, or I ain't coming back at all. I'm gonna come back mean or scared or in a neat little letter saying sorry for your loss.

(He wants to say: I'd run, if you asked me to. I'd stay, if you told me to.

He wants to say: please tell me to.)

Instead, he says: shut up, jerk, wanna go out tonight?

(He drinks himself half to death that night, fills himself up with that cheap nasty whiskey that tastes like Brooklyn back alleys. Steve has to practically drag him back home with the way he's stumbling.

"Fuck," he mumbles when his shoe catches on his other shoe, just like his old man falling all over the door frame at two in the morning, "'M just like him. 'M gonna end up just like him, Steve."

"No you ain't," Steve mumbles back, that soft voice he only used with his Ma or when he's talking to Bucky late at night in the dark, "And you won't. You're nothin' like him, Bucky."

When he uses that voice, quiet and assured like the way he holds his pencil, Bucky can maybe believe him for a little while.

And if Steve knows the shake in his hands is only half the alcohol's fault, he doesn't say anything. And if he knows how badly he wants to stay propped up against him, breathing that midnight air like he's dying for it, well, he doesn't say anything about that, either.)

-:-

 _ii. There will be time, there will be time_

 _To prepare a face to meet the faces that you meet;_

.

Barnes is going to die.

As much as Dugan hates to admit it, Barnes is probably going to die.

It'd be one thing if the kid was just a little beat on, just tired and sore like the rest of them, but he caught whatever's been going around last week ( _pneumonia, probably_ , is what Gabe said), and he hasn't been doing so hot.

And see, Dugan knows what it looks like when Barnes is off his game normally, but this. This is something else. No amount of shitty jokes or fake laughs can fix this (not for lack of trying; both of them stopped trying very often after Barnes couldn't catch his breath long enough to send Dugan into a vague panic). Barnes is weak, and starving, and so so sick, and just because that asshole guard is dead and out of the way doesn't mean his beating hasn't done its damage. Gabe had fixed him up as best he could, but there had still been so much blood.

Barnes is going to die.

Dugan prides himself on not getting easily attached. Growing up, he'd never stayed in one place very long. He looked out for his own ass because there was no one else around to do it, and when he went to war he looked out for his own ass because if he didn't his ass was gonna get shot. And in waltzed this city boy who seemed to look after everyone's ass but his own. And Dugan tried, he tried real hard not to get attached to the jackass, but then Bucky goddamn Barnes got that asshole Richards in trouble with their CO without even touching the guy, and Dugan was doomed.

("Jesus, don't call me _'Jimmy',"_ Barnes had complained at breakfast afterward, "Makes me sound like I'm five."

"You damn well act like it sometimes," Dugan had said through his toast.

Barnes had just flicked egg at him, proving his point further and solidifying their friendship.)

It's the worst thing he's ever done, because now they're stuck in a big metal death trap and Barnes is sick and Barnes is dying.

And it's not like he hasn't seen men die before—men die in this damn factory every day, or the little pig-faced scientist comes down and takes someone else away (usually the sick ones, the dying ones). It's just—he's practically a _kid_ , is the thing. Dugan wouldn't call himself old, but five years ago he woulda been scared out of his mind being out here, and Barnes manages as well as the best of them—hell, he's a Sergeant already. But he's practically a kid and Dugan got attached and now everything is horrible.

It's late one night, most of the other boys are asleep. Barnes is supposed to be asleep, and Dugan's supposed to be making sure he's asleep, but neither of them have every been very good at following the rules.

"They're gonna come for me." Barnes says, and his voice is all rough and scratchy and dry from coughing, words slurred like he's half awake.

"Don't talk like that, asshole," Dugan whispers back.

"They're gonna come for me soon," he says again, "so when you get out, you gotta—you gotta make sure my last pay is split. An' you gotta make sure one half goes to my sisters n' my ma, and the other half goes—goes to Steve, a'right?"

"Jimmy—"

"You know where to find him, yeah?" he goes on, stumbling over his words like he has to get them out quick, and of course Dugan does, Barnes has only talked about it a hundred times, "Middle a' Brooklyn—shitty apartment in the shitty part of town. And you _gotta_ tell him, Dum Dum—you gotta tell Steve to—to keep the damn windows shut in the winter, 'cause I ain't gonna be around to keep the radiator runnin' all night no more. You gotta _tell him_ , okay? Please, you gotta—"

"I'll tell him," he finally concedes, "I''ll tell him, okay Sarge? I'll tell him. Now get your ass to sleep."

When they do finally come for him, Dugan doesn't let him go easy. They yank him to his feet because the kid can barely stand, so damn out of it he doesn't seem to register what's going on.

"Hey," he shouts, and ignores whatever edge there is to his voice, "what kinda results are you gonna get from a sick kid, huh? Whatever experiment shit you're doing, I can last longer than him, I'm stronger than him—come on, you bastards, he won't last long, he's useless t' you."

And when they ignore him, put a boot in the kid's gut and watch him wretch, realize getting him to walk is a lost cause and start fucking dragging him away, something snaps.

"You're gonna kill him," he snarls, "get off, you're gonna fucking kill him stop, put him the fuck down, you bastards—"

"Hey," Barnes chokes out, stopping his stream; he catches Dugan's eye, delirious and terrified, "Split my pay, remember? And tell my sisters I love 'em, yeah?" because the bastard always has to be so goddamn dramatic.

He doesn't want to agree, because that sounds like giving up, it sounds like accepting the fact that Barnes is gonna get dragged off and cut up and never come back.

 _"Yeah?_ " he says again, and fuck, fuck he can't do this.

"Sure, Sarge," he makes himself say again, "I'll tell em."

The kid shoots him a sloppy version of that stupid cocky smile, and some vague, horrified part of him wants to cry, or maybe yell some more. Throw some shit.

Later, after he's worn himself out threatening the guards, he sits with the bars of the cell digging into his back, glares at the wall, and wonders how the hell he got stuck giving a shit, maybe even two, about this dumbass city kid. The others don't say anything; no false comforts, thank god, and no shit about the way his hands shake. Gabe's hands are steady, but his eyes are closed. He still has Barnes' blood on his sleeve.

-:-

 _iii. For I have known them all already, known them all:_

 _Have known the evenings, mornings, afternoons,_

 _I have measured out my life with coffee spoons;_

.

Bucky likes books, always has. Favorite part of school—he earned some of his best grades off of those tests, hastily scribbled essays all jumbled up because he had so much to say. He liked reading in his spare time too, what few books there were in the house and the ones he snuck out of libraries sometimes.

Sometimes, he thinks that if he went to college, he might've taken some fancy lit classes, right along with whatever science-y shit he could get his hands on—rumor had it that that Rich Genius Stark was tinkering with some honest to god robots, and he sure as hell wanted to be a part of that.

(He never did go to college, though, because college was money and time he didn't have.)

So he liked books, and he'd curl up on they're lumpy old couch some nights after the sun had set and the city was as loud as ever, and sometimes he would read out loud while Steve bent over his sketchbook and listened. He never was very good at reading for more than a few minutes, because the words were too small and his eyesight was shit, so he liked it when Bucky read to him, even if he'd never admit it. Bucky knew because he always smiled when he pitched your voice for different characters' dialogue, or talked all serious when something important happened.

He'd read to him in the winter too, when his bones ached and he couldn't get to sleep easy, and he'd read to him when he got sick, when he needed a distraction from the water in his lungs or how difficult it was to catch his breath.

And one time it was January—or November, maybe—and he'd settled down against the wall next to Steve's bed (it was Bad again, three days in to what looked to be a rough week and he needed to stay awake to keep the radiator going) and cracked open the book Becca got him for Christmas.

"What're you readin'?" Steve had slurred, all rough and feverish.

"Gatsby," he'd muttered back absently, and glanced up when Steve didn't answer, just stared at him. "I can start over, if you want. I'm only a few pages in."

"Nah," he'd murmured, sweaty forehead falling back against the pillow, "I'll figure it out as y' go along."

Bucky had really liked that book, he remembers. He isn't sure why, exactly. Part of him wished he could go to one of those big fancy parties where no one would look at him like he didn't belong in a ritzy place like that, and dress up and dance for hours and talk to dames all night. Part of him just liked the writing—he was no college boy, but he knew quality work when he saw it, and he saw it in the way Fitzgerald wrote about people.

"He smiled understandingly," he read, "much more than understandingly. It was one of those rare smiles with a quality of eternal reassurance in it, that you may come across four or five times in life. It faced—or seemed to face—the whole eternal world for an instant, and then concentrated on you with an irresistible prejudice in your favor. It understood you just as far as you wanted to be understood, believed in you as you would like to believe in yourself, and assured you that it had precisely the impression of you that, at your best, you hoped to convey."

He thought he'd come across smiles like that four or five times now, give or take. He thought Steve smiled like that, at his best.

And then he got to the longing and the desperation and the swimming pool and the lonely, lonely funeral, and he thought the only part of Steve he saw there was the smile.

He read about the man who came back from battle and found that the person he'd come home for had moved on, and he hoped the war stayed the hell away from him. He got the Letter and said goodbye, and he hoped the person he'd come back for would still be around when he got home.

And he stares up at the dirty ceiling and the restraints are pulled too tight around his chest and his wrists and his legs, and he thinks, selfishly, that he hopes Steve doesn't move on too quick. Eventually, of course—he doesn't want him mourning forever—but not as quick as Daisy and her Tom, not so quick that he'll forget him.

He doesn't want to be forgotten.

And the scientist says, through the haze, "It would be much simpler if you would stop struggling, Sergeant. You require too many men for the short walk to your cell."

Bucky tries to shrug, and says, "I like large parties, though," phantom pages brushing his fingertips and lights in the dancehall and a deep voice going 'those words ain't yours, damn plagiarist,' "They're so intimate. At small parties there isn't any privacy."

The tiny scientist blinks down at him and the blank look on his pig face makes him laugh so hard he sees stars.

-:-

 _iv. I have seen the moment of my greatness flicker,_

 _And I have seen the eternal Footman hold my coat, and snicker,_

 _And in short, I was afraid._

.

It's times like these that Steve wishes he still had the capacity to get drunk. (He'd been able to get a little bit of a buzz one time, when he drank up half a damn bar in England, but it just wasn't the same. Bucky had laughed at him when he complained and said damn, guess we'll never have another night like that one in The Bronx, and laughed harder when Steve told him to shut up.)

But it's probably for the best, he thinks. There has to be someone sober to keep the Commandos out of drunken trouble—which they excel in. Dugan likes to tell stories about the shit he and Bucky and Gabe used to get into. Bucky likes to tell stories about the shit Steve used to get into, like Bucky was any better.

Bucky's always been better at holding his liquor, though, which means he must've had a hell of a lot more than the others with the way he swaying, even with Steve holding him steady. Vaguely, Steve thinks he hasn't seen Bucky this drunk since the night he'd enlisted.

"Jesus," Steve mutters, dropping his friend down onto the bed in the room they'd rented for the night. Bucky lands hard. Kicks off his shoes gracelessly.

"Not Jesus," he murmurs, rolling onto his stomach. Steve snorts, and toes off his own shoes.

He'll fill out a few more reports before he goes to bed maybe, let Bucky sleep off the alcohol a little before he kicks him out. He's tugged off his jacket and flicked the small oil lamp on when he hears a heavy "Hey, Steve?"

"Hm?" he hums back.

"D'you think you're gonna make it?"

Steve glances up from his desk, "What d'you mean?"

"Back home," Bucky clarifies, and then sniffs and says "I hope you make it."

Steve gives a bemused smile and says, "I hope I make it, too,"

"I don't think I'm gonna make it." Bucky says, rubs at his eyes.

Steve blinks, "What're you talkin' about, of course you will."

"Nah," he drawls, "But I mean…I think I'm okay with that. I'm scared of dyin', though. I'm real scared of dyin'. Scared of wakin' up back there."

Bucky's always been at his most honest when he's drunk, Steve's learned. And he's been off lately, ever since that factory, he sleeps too little and eats too little and flinches too much.

"You're never goin' back there," Steve says firmly.

Bucky hums, "Hope not. Zola's gross."

Steve smiles, "Yeah,"

"Yeah," Bucky repeats, "Has lotsa needles. Hate needles."

Steve thinks about how tense Bucky is in the infirmary and the way his eyes go all vacant whenever someone takes a blood sample and says, "You afraid of needles?"

"Maybe. Afraid of lotsa things, now—just like my pa, hah." there's a pause, where Steve thinks he might have fallen asleep like he does when he's wasted, "Scared of you, sometimes."

Steve feels his breath catch, "What?"

"Scared of," Bucky yawns, buries his face in the pillow, "what y'might do for everyone else. 'Cause you're still a self-sacrificin' idiot, Steve," he slurs, "and I dunno what I'll do if you ain't around no more. So stick around a little longer, yeah?"

It sounds like he's asking for a lot more—it sounds like he should know what he's asking for, but he doesn't, because Bucky doesn't tell him things anymore and barely sleeps and thinks he's not gonna make it through the war. And Steve doesn't know if he can promise something like this, because he may have started out with an idealistic view of war but he's been a part of it now and he knows how easy promises like this are broken.

But he swallows hard anyways and says "Sure, Buck, of course I will. I don't plan on dying anytime soon."

What's visible of Bucky's left eyebrow furrows like he doesn't believe him, but all he says is 'don't fuckin'…' before he's actually asleep this time.

Downstairs, he can still hear people laughing.

(He thinks that Bucky was probably going to tell him not to promise things like that, but Steve thinks he can damn well promise whatever he wants to.)

(They don't talk about it later.)

-:-

 _v. No! I am not Prince Hamlet, nor was meant to be;_

 _Am an attendant lord, one that will do_

 _To swell a progress, start a scene or two_

.

Barnes is real good at poker. Dugan found that out the hard way, back at basic, when he lost four cigarettes and his entire M&M's supply to the little shit.

He's real good, but Dugan's been practicing (mainly on Monty, because the guy can't bluff for shit), and when the kid gets back from Rogers' Crazy Train Jumping Mission, he's gonna be in for the game of his life.

It's cold in Stark's fancy plane, where they're all waiting for Cap and Barnes and Gabe to come back, hopefully with Zola, and Dugan's never been particularly good with the cold, so he's thinking of campfires and beating Monty again and not at all ready for the huge gust of wind that blows the cards all over the place when the plane hatch opens up.

He grumbles and bends to pick the damn things up, shivering when the hatch screeches shut again.

"Where's Barnes?" he hears Jim ask, and looks up, hands stilling.

They got Zola, cuffs around his pudgy little wrists in the seat next to Gabe. Rogers is very very still where he stands. Barnes isn't here. Dugan feels his heart sink.

"Where's Barnes?" he asks this time. He thinks he sees Rogers flinch, just a bit, at his name. Dugan can't see his face from where he's crouched, and, if the sinking feeling in his stomach is right, he doesn't think he wants to see what his Captain looks like right now.

"He's," Gabe takes a controlled breath, closes his eyes; Dugan feels the focus of the room shift with him, "He—fell. He's gone."

No one speaks.

Dugan feels like he can't breathe.

No one moves, until Dugan reacts, throws the cards down hard and yanks Zola out of his seat and shoves him hard into the wall, shakes off the hand on his shoulder and the "Dugan, don't" because

"Fuckin Nazi coward," he snarls, too angry to be satisfied at the way the doctor finches and recoils, pig-face stark white.

"Fucker," he spits, and he thinks about Barnes and his too-tired eyes and the way they lit the hell up whenever he talked about his sisters, "He had shit he was gonna do," he says, thinks about how he's never gonna see his sisters graduate and how he's never gonna see the Grand Canyon and how he's never gonna beat Dugan's ass at poker again, "He was gonna go _home."_

He thinks about wry smiles and distracted humming and the way the kid's youth shown through all the mud on his face when he told stories back in Italy and, "Whatever information you have," he growls, glares into this worthless man's terrified eyes and hopes he knows what the fuck he's done, hopes he knows he's damned, "you weren't goddamn worth it. It should've been you who fucking _fell."_

He spits at him. It splatters across Zola's stupid glasses and then he's sliding to the floor because Dugan can't stand to touch this disgusting man for another second.

(Some ugly part of him wants to blame the Captain. To blame Rogers, Barnes' best fucking friend for having his back every other time but this, when it mattered more than anything, but that wouldn't be fair because they were waiting for them when it happened. And they were laughing. They were messing around because Morita had cracked some joke or Monty had done something stupid or—something—something—it doesn't matter, because they were waiting, and they were laughing when it happened. Dugan was laughing when it happened.)

He wants to storm off but there's no where to storm off to on Stark's goddamn plane that had always seemed way bigger than it actually is right now, because right now it's too small and suffocating and Dugan can't do anything but stomp over to his seat and sit down hard, buckle up aggressively and then sink down as far as he can.

He wants to do something, he doesn't wanna sit here and wait and stew in his thoughts when they should be out looking or something, doing _something._

(Because the kid survived before, when he was dragged off and tortured and everyone thought he was dead—he'd gone through this exact thing and then Barnes had stumbled out of the factory with an arm draped over Rogers' shoulder and he had been alive, so. So there was no reason he couldn't have survived this, right? He survived before so maybe he survived this time too why were they just sitting around—)

He pulls his hat down to shield his eyes so he doesn't have to look at anyone and so he doesn't have to look at Rogers and he digs his nails into his opposite hand to keep them from shaking and he wants to do something and maybe wants to punch the hell out of Zola but he can't do that for some stupid reason and there's nothing else to do but sit and want.

Rogers is a heavy silent presence in the room and there's no one here telling shitty jokes or bitching about rifles because Barnes isn't here because Barnes fell off the damn train and all Dugan can think about was how the kid laughed and how sharp the rocks at the bottom of the ravine looked.

Soldiers die everyday because that's what soldiers do, and Dugan wants to laugh because fuck, Barnes never wanted to be a goddamn soldier, so of course he had to be the one to go and die.

And isn't that the goddamn tragedy of the century, Dugan thinks. Barnes always did love his drama.


End file.
